XChange 2012: Enterprises Still Looking For Mobility Strategy

The significant return on investment from implementing a cutting-edge mobility strategy can help enterprise succeed, and while businesses recognize this fact, many have not adopted robust systems. As a result, VARs have an opportunity to fill this need, says Kevin Benedict, an independent enterprise mobility analyst.

Benedict, in a presentation Tuesday at XChange 2012 in Dallas, Texas, said that 40 percent of companies have strategies for enterprise mobility, and 42 percent said they plan to deploy more than six enterprise mobility applications within six months.

"Nobody wants to be tethered to a cubicle or a desktop anymore," Benedict said in a presentation on enterprise mobility. "But there are a lot of plans, and not much strategy, so they are looking at outsourcing."

Benedict said enterprises expect much from mobility. In a survey he conducted, asking enterprise executives what ROI they want from mobility, 79.1 percent named increased productivity; 66.9 percent cited efficiency gains; 48.6 percent named improved customer research and service; and 43.4 percent listed reduced cost.

Deploying mobile, connected devices throughout a company can give the business a competitive advantage through its ability to enable situational awareness and dynamic decision-making as workers communicate easily and quickly and share information across devices and geographic locations, he said.

However, as many as 50 percent of enterprises are not engineered for an up-to-date mobility strategy, he said.

"So much has changed in mobility, yet you [businesses] haven't changed anything," he said.

Benedict said solution providers should be aware of the top challenges facing businesses as they consider a deployment.

They need to develop company-wide strategies; they need to identify the ROI mobility will bring; and they need to educate their executives on the full competitive advantages mobility will bring their business.

"The challenge is to get them to understand that mobility can change the business," he said.

While a large group of EMC's investors continue to hope that EMC will sell parts of itself to create more clear valuation for them, EMC is likely heading in the opposite direction by considering more acquisitions, according to a top analyst.